Gavin Newsom learning political lessons from Gov. Jerry Brown

Lt. Gov. Gavin Newsom says he is finally catching on to what his job is all about while learning lessons in being a father.

Lt. Gov. Gavin Newsom says he is finally catching on to what his...

Gavin Newsom didn't have to sweat this week's election. As everyone expected, the former San Francisco mayor cruised to a lopsided win in the primary for lieutenant governor without much effort.

Newsom thought he was playing it pretty cool - until he spoke to Gov. Jerry Brown last Wednesday.

"Hey, I was just up at the Russian River, rafting," Brown told him.

"You are making that up," Newsom said. "You've got an election next week."

"No," Brown said. "I bought a raft and Anne (Gust, his wife) and I got in with the dog and we floated."

Of course, despite the raft excursion, Brown romped to an even more convincing win than Newsom in the primary. As Brown continues an all-but-certain march to an unprecedented fourth term as governor, Newsom is shaking his head.

"It's surreal, incredible," he says. "He's unique among the unique. He's a political mastermind, and I don't use that word lightly. We're playing checkers and he's playing chess."

Newsom now freely admits that the last four years have been an education - with some hard lessons along the way. He came into the office gung-ho - bristling with ideas, wonky policy thoughts and that perfect hair. He was going to remake the office of lieutenant governor, take on the big stuff and move the political needle.

It wasn't long before he got the message - cool your jets, pal.

The low point was probably when he marched into Brown's office (and this is so Newsom) with an idea for "an executive order to create an interagency council on the homeless." Newsom thought it would be perfect; he could muck around in policy, stay out of Brown's way and still keep a strong public profile.

Just pipe down

The response? Why don't you just pipe down and focus on California universities and the Land Use Commission like the lieutenant governor is supposed to?

"That was my a-ha," Newsom says. "I was like, OK, I get it. As Willie Brown reminded me in a (Chronicle) column, Jerry's the governor, you're not. I called Willie and I said, 'Thank you. I needed to read that.' "

It isn't hard to picture an earlier version of Newsom - the boy wonder destined for greatness - going into a pout when he found he wasn't in the loop. With Brown set for another term, and Sen. Dianne Feinstein in place until at least 2018, Newsom is stuck in political limbo.

Instead, he makes a convincing case that he's stepped back, "taken a deep breath" and discovered the joys of weekends, family - and most of all - fatherhood. Newsom and his wife Jennifer have three children, Montana, 4, Hunter, 2, and Brooklyn, 11 months.

"Last weekend I was at (Montana's) ballet recital," he said. "I was so nervous. I had the camera out. I think I jumped over someone's kid. I was like: Sorry, I didn't know she was coming up next. It's just the richness, the fullness, the joy, the stress, the empathy. I mean I watch TV commercials and I start crying. John Boehner has nothing on me. It's the greatest thing times infinity."

And that's when you think the political gods might have known what they were doing all along. No one has ever doubted Newsom's sound bites, charisma or ambition. The knock has been that he seemed a little plastic, lacking the common touch. He says parenthood, and this enforced down time, has him putting this political run in perspective.

He recalls now how his patron and mentor, Willie Brown, told him he was going to appoint him to the Film Commission in 1996, at the age of 29. Then, typically, Brown changed his mind at the podium during the swearing-in ceremony and announced that Newsom would be chairman of the Parking and Traffic Commission.

'Baptism by fire'

"I had no idea, no heads-up," Newsom says. "Literally, I'm like: I'm the chair of what?"

A year later, Supervisor Kevin Shelley won a seat in the Assembly and Brown appointed Newsom to replace him. In 2004, he was sworn in as mayor.

"It was a baptism by fire," he says. "Everything was a fire hose."

He says he now realizes that's the perspective he brought to Sacramento.

"It was years and years of running at a sprint," he says. "I had the mind-set of a mayor. And you want to stay in it because that's your comfort zone. And then you realize I can't call Ed Lee every day and talk about Octavia Boulevard. He is not interested in getting that call."

Instead, he jokes that he's spoken at every Rotary Club in the state, is reading four policy books at a time, and is trying to teach Hunter to hit a whiffle ball.

"I'm on my third T-ball set because I couldn't believe the fault was the coach," he says. "Either the bat was too big or the set was too tall. Of course, now I am blaming the coach, which is me."

Although he still sounds wonky enough to crank up another of his famous 7 1/2-hour state of the city speeches, the hope is that he has become a softer, more personable version of himself. He even has some streaks of gray in his hair, which has been the subject of epic teasing.

"You know I walked by that Just for Men display in Walgreens the other day," he said. "I have walked by it before, but this time I stopped and thought about it."